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Crafting the perfect response

Christine Todd Whitman gives her response speech to Clinton's State of the Union speech. |
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“I’m not going to ask for equal time,” Whitman joked after Clinton finally wrapped up his speech, forcing her to cut her own speech short. Whitman had just spent several panicked moments before the speech debating with her staff — should she make a joke?

“I said, do you think it’s rude? I didn’t want to be rude to the president, but I felt like I had to acknowledge the amount of time he had used,” she said. “I opened with that, and it broke the ice.”

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“It’s probably one of the toughest speaking assignments in American politics because you’re following the president at the moment when the president looks most presidential and you don’t really know what you’re supposed to say first,” Kusnet said.

Experts point to a plethora of problems that plague the rebuttals: bad staging, the speakers’ lack of confidence in using teleprompters and politicians’ giving performances rather than heart-felt communication. The speeches are often overmanaged by party operatives and laced with clichés.
In recent years, speakers have experimented, giving the speeches before live audiences or to an empty room. Whitman was the first to experiment with a live audience, giving her speech in the chamber of the New Jersey Assembly.

Last year, Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell gave his speech to a full room in the Virginia House of Delegates, a staging move that some experts criticized, saying it looked like McDonnell was trying to upstage the president — even as he stood in the smaller Richmond chamber.

“It’s an awful spectacle when they try to look and sound like the president,” said Shesol. “McDonnell looked and sounded very small town, small budget after seeing the president address Congress.”
Jindal, who was rebutting President Barack Obama’s first speech before a joint session of Congress, spent a large chunk of his speech retelling a story from his childhood and attacking the Democrats — a sign he was trying to introduce himself to the nation as a potential presidential candidate. But Jindal, who is known for his rapid-fire speaking style and command of wonky policy facts, instead tried to stage himself as a slower-speaking, folksy Southern politician.

It didn’t work.

“With Jindal, you had this self-promotional aspect where he was running through his stock biography. He was self-consciously introducing himself to America,” Shesol said.

In some cases, speakers have very little time to prepare. Kaine had barely been in office a few weeks when Democratic Party leaders asked him to give the speech. The governor had done well among independent voters in what had been a red state, which leadership wanted to project as a nationwide goal for the party in the 2006 midterms.

Readers' Comments (22)

Well let's hope they find someone better than "Weasal Bobby" Jidal. Eric Cantor would be good at that time of night. Listening to him talk would be like taking a sedative with a fifth of Scotch might be the best night sleep a lot of citizens have gotten in a while. They could get a couple rolls of "Bounty the quicker picker upper", and have Boehner sob out a response. Probably the best bet would just have McConnell come out and say "We don't like him, we don't agree, and we are taking our ball and going home" stick out his tongue and walk away from the camera. Short, to the point and believable. Who ever they find, they should let them know that it will probably be the beginning of the end of their political career.

The Republicans started this response crap when they lost miserably in three major elections in 1994, 2006 and 2008. If you remember, the republicans wanted President Clinton to complete his four year term in four months and get out; when he refused to, the republicans accused him of having sex with a woman and tried to force him to resign. It has been down hill for the republican party ever since - even to the point the republican party is now a divided house, and we know what happens to a divided house. It seems like, every way the republicans turn, they stick a very dirty foot in their mouth and then look at you like you are so dumb that you don't know they just stuck both feet in their mouth. That dumb look the republicans always get on their face when they lie to you is probably a bleed over from the Bush reign.

The Republicans started this response crap when they lost miserably in three major elections in 1994, 2006 and 2008. If you remember, the republicans wanted President Clinton to complete his four year term in four months and get out; when he refused to, the republicans accused him of having sex with a woman and tried to force him to resign. It has been down hill for the republican party ever since - even to the point the republican party is now a divided house, and we know what happens to a divided house. It seems like, every way the republicans turn, they stick a very dirty foot in their mouth and then look at you like you are so dumb that you don't know they just stuck both feet in their mouth. That dumb look the republicans always get on their face when they lie to you is probably a bleed over from the Bush reign.

The Republicans started this response crap when they lost miserably in three major elections in 1994, 2006 and 2008. If you remember, the republicans wanted President Clinton to complete his four year term in four months and get out; when he refused to, the republicans accused him of having sex with a woman and tried to force him to resign. It has been down hill for the republican party ever since - even to the point the republican party is now a divided house, and we know what happens to a divided house. It seems like, every way the republicans turn, they stick a very dirty foot in their mouth and then look at you like you are so dumb that you don't know they just stuck both feet in their mouth. That dumb look the republicans always get on their face when they lie to you is probably a bleed over from the Bush reign.

The Republicans started this response crap when they lost miserably in three major elections in 1994, 2006 and 2008. If you remember, the republicans wanted President Clinton to complete his four year term in four months and get out; when he refused to, the republicans accused him of having sex with a woman and tried to force him to resign. It has been down hill for the republican party ever since - even to the point the republican party is now a divided house, and we know what happens to a divided house. It seems like, every way the republicans turn, they stick a very dirty foot in their mouth and then look at you like you are so dumb that you don't know they just stuck both feet in their mouth. That dumb look the republicans always get on their face when they lie to you is probably a bleed over from the Bush reign.

TYPICAL Democrat comment--- carefully crafted to avoid the truth, but not to appear an out-right lie, their preferred methodology.

It seems that Clinton DID have sex with "that woman" on SEVERAL occasions. That is, he did in the PROPER use of the word. I know that "proper use" holds no value with Democrats, however.

The simple FACT is: Clinton disgraced the office of President, they repeatedly lied about it. Period. That he should have been impeached is not in question, he should have been because he disgraced the office through his repeated lying denials of his acts. To think otherwise shows a complete and utter disregard for the truth. And that is typical of what Democrats seem to do. If not always, then certainly quite frequently.

Rather than obfuscate, Democrats (and a few Republicans), need to simply be open to the public. Something that the current obfuscator in chief might well benefit from. He might well find a lot more support from the American public if he were to release documentation he has chosen to hide from them. People are by nature suspicious of anyone who continually evades who they are, for they know they are trying to hide something. So, Democrat in chief, come clean! Might be just what you need to become the great saviour of America in Her time of need. Or not.

Try reading Post#9. But then, maybe you are just trying (again) to see if by repeating the same story over, and over, and over- and in your particular case, over again, you can get sane, rational people to accept your prattle.

Your leaders tried that for two years, 2009 and 2010, and it just isn't working for you anymore. Try saying it once. If it is worth saying at all.

Do you mean the Wicked Witch of the West? California being the West? I'm for that! Haven't had a good dose from any of the Three Stooges since they lost their total power to corrupt. Perfect examples of "Absolute power corrupts absolutely" , they were. Am looking forward to the Chief Corrupter's speech coming up soon. (And looking forward even MORE to the investigations into his extra-legal application of his office.)